My Day at the Beach

The UK has some awesome beaches up and down the coast. West coast, East coast, South coast, Scottish coast, Welsh coast, Northern Irish coast, all of them offer swimming and more.

I’ve gathered a decent collection of stories from the UK beach holidays of my childhood, most of them ending with me being either sandy, soaked, sun burnt, or any combination of those.

I don’t think I’m anywhere near being alone in this (the amount of other families we’d run into on these cheap family holidays backs me up in this), but at some point during most summers, the big six-man tent would be loaded into the boot of the car, and we’d be driven from London to some campsite by the sea. Mostly it was Devon or Cornwall, but sometimes we’d go to Wales or somewhere along the south coast.

Anyway, once the tent had been set up, and we’d done some basic shopping, it’d be down to the beach nearly every day we were there. Whilst on the beach, there were a number of different things that could happen.

The most common occurrence is that I’d have a great day and not want to leave. What this normally resulted in was me running down the beach towards the sea once my parents decided it was time to leave. Normally, my dad would be in hot pursuit. Having just convinced me to change and get ready for the ride home, there was no way he’d let me remember how great the sea was.

More frequently than I would care to admit, I’d make it to the sea, run in and turn around to smirk at my dad, then wonder why he was stood at the edge of the water staring at something behind me. I’d look over my shoulder just in time to be knocked from my feet by some enormous wave, and get tumbled by it right up to wherever he was standing (I still don’t know how he managed to position himself this well).

After I’d been fished out of the water, I’d be led to the car where I would sit in my wet clothes, quietly and sullenly reflecting on where my hubris had led me, and slowly dripping a puddle of sea water on to the floor.